HDMI Cable Debate: Does price really dictate quality?

[Death916]

ya price is no factor, I got a cable on amazon for 2.50 and it works as well as my 40 ones that were gold plated and fancy haha

 

[Omegatronacles]

At a distance of 15 meters, Monster showed a marginally better picture quality over the No Name brand. And when I say marginally, I mean that if they hadn't been sitting right next to each other, I would never ever have noticed.

Out of curiosity, did you switch the cables to ensure the quality difference wasn't elsewhere in the setup?

A fair question. Yes, I switched the cables between the TV's, so that random manufacturing flaws could not be held accountable for any difference in results I got.

 

[Denari]

There really is no difference between "high" quality name brands and no name brands. It's probably you're TV or something. I personally got a 6 ft HDMI cable for like $1.50 thanks to a friend with connections to Chinese markets.

 

[Ziadaine_v1legacy]

Nope. My old man was about to pick up a 3m HDMI cable for $70 and I took it off his hands and said "noooooo".

There's ZERO difference, they all have the same structure, the ONLY difference is the brand thats been popped on each head to make it LOOK the best.

Sometimes I'm glad that my dad's a cheapskate... Sounds like you have a tough time keeping track of the man.

Oh hes the typical cheapskate grocery shopper, but technology wise I have to make sure he doesn't get himself ripped off.

 

[Mr Pantomime]

I got my HDMI cable for $16. Its the toughest motherfucking cable anyone has ever seen. Also, its striped like a bee and this amuses me

 

[mr_pants66]

i am a heavy user of HDMI i have about 6 of them running from place to place and they ranged in price they all work and the most expensive one is no better that the cheapest one.

 

[brainslurper]

Ya Monster can rightly go fuck themselves. They charge such a ridiculous price for products which are NO better than a product you can get for much much cheaper..

it's like mac!
just kidding, the overpriced apple cables are only like 20 bucks more, and they look fucking awesome. not going to bring mac computers into it.

 

[Shapsters]

Ya Monster can rightly go fuck themselves. They charge such a ridiculous price for products which are NO better than a product you can get for much much cheaper..

it's like mac!
just kidding, the overpriced apple cables are only like 20 bucks more, and they look fucking awesome. not going to bring mac computers into it.

*shakes fist*

Don't get me started on those fruity bastards!

See what I did there? With the Apple and the fruity? Ehhhh?

 

[Baby Tea]

At 6 foot, no, there's no point unless you want durability. Digital is digital and isn't as affected by signal loss as an analog cable would.

This, to a degree.

At 6, even 10 and 12 feet, there is no difference. I buy the Belkin HMDI cables at $20 a pop. Just awesome.
But at much larger distances, 20, 25, 30 feet or more, then a better, gold plated connection is recommended.
But, honestly, who the heck has their player 30 feet away from their TV? People with a serious theater set up.
So let them buy $120 cables at those lengths. The rest of us can buy the $20 cables and enjoy our games/movies.

 

[brainslurper]

So, for a typical TV user, there is no advantage to "premium" HDMI cables. I would personally recommend that you buy your cables from a local store than online, simply because these cables do come with a warranty, and it's far easier to claim a warranty from the store you bought it at as opposed to trying to get some faceless person online to honour a warranty..

buy from amazon. they have a great return policy. if you literally have a reason to be returning something, they will take it back. also, hdmi from them is 7 bucks.

 

[moretimethansense]

I got a 2m cable from the pound shop and it's served my purposes just fine, buying a cable for more than a few quid seems like an increadibly stupis thing to do.

 

[Sexual Harassment Panda]

I work in TV retail. My store sells Monster HDMI cables. We also sell no name brand HDMI cables.

I have set up tests using two identical TV's, two identical Blu Ray players, running identical Blu Ray movies, one set using the Monster HDMI and the other set using the no name brand.

At a distance of 1.5 meters, there was absolutely no difference in picture quality between Monster and No Name.

At a distance of 5 meters, there was absolutely no difference in picture quality between Monster and No Name.

At a distance of 15 meters, Monster showed a marginally better picture quality over the No Name brand. And when I say marginally, I mean that if they hadn't been sitting right next to each other, I would never ever have noticed.

At a distance of greater than 15 meters, I stopped the test, because quite frankly if your TV is 15 meters away from your HDMI device, you either need to rethink the arrangement of your loungeroom, or you should have had someone professionally wire up the house with HDMI.

So, for a typical TV user, there is no advantage to "premium" HDMI cables. I would personally recommend that you buy your cables from a local store than online, simply because these cables do come with a warranty, and it's far easier to claim a warranty from the store you bought it at as opposed to trying to get some faceless person online to honour a warranty.

Although, since it's possible to get cables online for less than a cup of coffee, sometimes even the warranty doesn't matter.

Do you get commission on the ridiculously priced cables?

I bought a 3DTV from comet and the salesman tried to sell me a "HDMI 1.4" cable for £80, he was pretty insistant that my set-up just wouldn't work if I didn't have it...I knew that not to be true. Anyway, he wouldn't drop it until I threatened not to buy the TV.

 

[vxicepickxv]

I work in TV retail. My store sells Monster HDMI cables. We also sell no name brand HDMI cables.

I have set up tests using two identical TV's, two identical Blu Ray players, running identical Blu Ray movies, one set using the Monster HDMI and the other set using the no name brand.

At a distance of 1.5 meters, there was absolutely no difference in picture quality between Monster and No Name.

At a distance of 5 meters, there was absolutely no difference in picture quality between Monster and No Name.

At a distance of 15 meters, Monster showed a marginally better picture quality over the No Name brand. And when I say marginally, I mean that if they hadn't been sitting right next to each other, I would never ever have noticed.

At a distance of greater than 15 meters, I stopped the test, because quite frankly if your TV is 15 meters away from your HDMI device, you either need to rethink the arrangement of your loungeroom, or you should have had someone professionally wire up the house with HDMI.

So, for a typical TV user, there is no advantage to "premium" HDMI cables. I would personally recommend that you buy your cables from a local store than online, simply because these cables do come with a warranty, and it's far easier to claim a warranty from the store you bought it at as opposed to trying to get some faceless person online to honour a warranty.

Although, since it's possible to get cables online for less than a cup of coffee, sometimes even the warranty doesn't matter.

I get my cables from monoprice, because they're cheap enough to the point where I can get 10 for the price of 1 to 2 in a store. That way I don't really need to worry about a warranty.

 

[Seitou]

Yup it's a scam, it's an old throwaway from a time where shit like monster cabling actually made a noticeable difference. HDMI cabling is already grossly overpriced, don't get anything more complex then gold plated connections.

 

[elcamino41383]

I got a Rocketfish brand cable when I first got my HD TV, and from the get-go it wasn't all that good. It would keep jostling loose. When it finally broke (thanks to my dog jumping off my bed and tripping over my headphone cord and dragging my PS3 down to the floor...) I went and got a new cord at Target that was nearly $40 less expensive and its never once jostled loose. The visual quality between the 2 is completely indistinguishable. From now on, I'm buying the cheaper ones!

 

[Hoplon]

The "gold plating" isn't any better than the none plated version, since the core material is identical, unless both the socket your plugging in to and the connector on the cable are solid gold the conductive properties and possible "corrosion" over the life time of the device are no different.

The plating thing is a total scam.

 

[imperialreign]

I work in TV retail. My store sells Monster HDMI cables. We also sell no name brand HDMI cables.

I have set up tests using two identical TV's, two identical Blu Ray players, running identical Blu Ray movies, one set using the Monster HDMI and the other set using the no name brand.

At a distance of 1.5 meters, there was absolutely no difference in picture quality between Monster and No Name.

At a distance of 5 meters, there was absolutely no difference in picture quality between Monster and No Name.

At a distance of 15 meters, Monster showed a marginally better picture quality over the No Name brand. And when I say marginally, I mean that if they hadn't been sitting right next to each other, I would never ever have noticed.

At a distance of greater than 15 meters, I stopped the test, because quite frankly if your TV is 15 meters away from your HDMI device, you either need to rethink the arrangement of your loungeroom, or you should have had someone professionally wire up the house with HDMI.

So, for a typical TV user, there is no advantage to "premium" HDMI cables. I would personally recommend that you buy your cables from a local store than online, simply because these cables do come with a warranty, and it's far easier to claim a warranty from the store you bought it at as opposed to trying to get some faceless person online to honour a warranty.

Although, since it's possible to get cables online for less than a cup of coffee, sometimes even the warranty doesn't matter.

That sums it all up right there.

Only over extremelly long distances you might have some signal degradation with cheaper cables, but it'll hadly be noticeable . . . and the distance involved for a signal to degrade like that, you shouldn't be worried about in a home setup.

Same is true for digital audio cable and shielded analogue.

This is one area where you don't always get what you pay for. There are a lot of manufacturers preying upon consumer ignorance of the home theater/audio setups.

 

[ScorpSt]

95% of the time, a cable is a cable, no matter what the price. With HDMI cables though, you need to look out for the version number. The most recent version is 1.4. As long as you get that, you could pay $10 or $10,000 and still wind up with the same cable.